Forgiven In Time
by NCISgirl1527
Summary: Charlie and Paige talk over how everything went down with Lauren. Paige is worried that Lauren will never forgive her, but Charlie tries to convince her otherwise.


_**I really like Paige so after last week's episode I started wondering how she felt about the whole thing with Lauren. Hope you like it.**_

_**Disclaimer: Not mine**_

_**Spoilers: Heat Run**_

"Did Lauren leave yet?" Paige asked joining Charlie at the kitchen counter.

"Yeah," Charlie replied, grabbing a second beer out of the fridge, "nearly two hours ago."

"Right," Paige said with a sigh, taking the beer.

"Don't worry about her," Charlie told her friend.

"She hates me," Paige said frustrated.

"For now," Charlie said, "but she'll get away from here and get her head screwed on right. Then she'll understand why you and Briggs did what you did."

"You think?" Paige asked.

"She's smart," Charlie replied with a shrug, "she'll realized that you save her life by getting her out of here. She got in too deep. Someone had to pull her out before she got in too deep to ever get out."

"I hope you're right," Paige told her, taking a sip of her beer.

For a moment the two women sat in silence, thinking of various things. Finally Charlie spoke, "Do you think it will happen to us?" she asked, looking out the window at the setting sun.

"Standing in front of a speeding semi driven by the Russian mafia?" Paige told her, "probably not."

"You know what I mean," Charlie said, "Lauren and I, we started at Graceland about the same time."

"Lauren was wound tightly," Paige pointed out, "we all knew that, but after Donny was shot, she changed. She was reckless, but she also somehow ended up wound even tighter than before. She finally snapped."

"You think we're going to snap?" Charlie asked.

"I don't think so," Paige replied with a slight smirk, "we're not wound tightly enough."

"Cheers to that," Charlie said with a grin, lifting her beer bottle. Paige tapped hers against Charlie's and both women took another drink. "I hope she gets reassigned to Miami," Charlie remarked after another few moments of silence.

"Do you think there's something there?" Paige asked.

"Donny," Charlie replied.

"I mean do you think there's something between her and Donny," Paige said rolling her eyes.

"Definitely," Charlie said, "that's why I hope that Lauren ends up in Miami. Those two ending up together would do both of them good."

"I think you're right," Paige remarked, "but I'm going to miss both of them."

"Me too," Charlie said, "Are you getting someone new to take their place?"

"No," Paige grimaced, "apparently the DEA only wants to have one agent in Graceland now. They want you guys to have to do most of the work I guess. I think that whole think with Lauren and Donny made them a little skittish."

"They aren't going to pull you out," Charlie asked concernedly, "Are they?"

"I don't think so," Paige said smiling, "I've cause caused too much trouble back east for anyone to want to deal with me."

"I feel like that's true of all of us," Charlie said.

"Probably is," Paige agreed, "this is our own little island of misfit toys after all."

"Except Lauren," Charlie point out, "she was a rising star, even after she came here."

"A little like your boy Mike," Paige pointed out.

Charlie did not say anything. That though had already occurred to her more than once. Mike and Lauren might not seem it at first, but in some ways they were very similar. Both were smart talented agents who believed in strict adherence to the rulebook, or at least had at one point. Charlie did vaguely wonder if Mike would go the same way as Lauren.

"It's not going to feel like Graceland without Lauren and Donny," Paige said, changing the subject because she realized that Charlie was not going to respond to her previous comment.

"It will," Charlie said still looking out the window, but realizing the look Paige was giving her, she elaborated. "We don't define Graceland. Graceland is its own thing. I remember the DEA agent they had here before you: Rebecca Stanton. She was great, and we were friends, but then they transferred her to Arizona. I thought Graceland would be different, but it wasn't. Sun rose the next morning and things were pretty much the same as they had been before."

"I guess that makes sense," Paige said, "Agents come and go, and each of us has a hundred different aliases in between. I guess really the only thing that doesn't change is the house and our loyalty to it. The house is the constant."

"It has to be," Charlie pointed out, "If the house isn't constant, if we put ourselves above Graceland—"

"It all falls apart," Paige finished, "and people die."

"Exactly," Charlie agreed.

"And that's why Lauren had to leave," Paige said, "it was to save us not her."

"It was to save everyone," Charlie corrected her, "If Graceland had been burned, it would have been the end of all of us, Lauren included."

"Would you have done the same thing I did?" Paige asked, "If you had been in my situation."

Charlie looked at her friend. She could tell Paige was still uncomfortable with the way things had gone down, and Charlie could not blame her. It was one thing to lie to strangers and criminals. It was quite another to feel like you had double-crossed a friend.

"Yes," Charlie said finally, "I would have."

"You think you would have," Paige muttered quietly.

"I know I would have because I did," Charlie told her, "Rebecca, the agent who you replaced, she got into something way too deep, just like Lauren, and I did what you did."

"How did she react?" Paige asked curiously.

"She hated me for it," Charlie said honestly. Paige looked at her, knowing that there had to be more to the story or Charlie would not be telling it. "Then a year ago she sent me this in the mail." Charlie took a piece of paper out of her pocket and set it on the table so Paige could see it. "That's her new baby girl," Charlie explained, "Once she moved to Arizona, she got her head screwed back on straight. She fell in love, got married, and had little Audrey Catherine."

"You think it will be that way with Lauren?" Paige asked.

"I cannot promise you that she'll ever tell you about it," Charlie said, "but I can promise you that she will forgive you in time."

_**I had no idea how that was going to end until I wrote it…it just sort of happened, but I think it works. Please review. **_


End file.
